Gregg Rosenthal

The Giants saved their worst for last.

In Big Blue's final game at Giants Stadium, the team was humiliated 41-9 by the Carolina Panthers. The defensive collapse wasn’t a shock, but the context from last week’s game made it more painful.

On Monday night against the Redskins, the Giants defense convinced themselves that they could turn the clock to 2007. Fans started to believe the pass rush could carry them.

On Sunday, the terrible 2009 Giants defense we’ve seen all year showed up again. One of the most highly paid defensive lines in football was a disaster, like so many other games this season.

Credit John Fox’s Carolina Panthers for being tougher upfront on both sides of the ball. Let’s not hear the injury excuses in New York: Carolina was missing two Pro Bowl tackles and DeAngelo Williams at running back. Jonathan Stewart and the backup linemen filled in quite nicely to lead the Panthers to 247 yards rushing.

The Giants secondary hasn’t been able to cover all season; they gave up three touchdown passes to Matt Moore and only forced five incompletions. The Giants haven’t been able to run either; Brandon Jacobs was held to one yard on six carries.

New York won a Super Bowl two years ago by being tougher than the competition. Sunday was a reminder that the 2009 Giants are easily pushed around.

Playoff-bound
1. New England finally put together four quarters — 35-7 over Jacksonville — just in time to feel good heading into the playoffs. Bill Belichick has seen improved play from his secondary since re-inserting safety James Sanders and cornerback Shawn Springs into the starting lineup. The Patriots have given up only 27 points combined in the last three games. Of course, they will face far better passing attacks in January than those run by Carolina, Buffalo, and Jacksonville.

2. Green Bay reached the playoffs by ripping Seattle 48-10. The Packers will be very tough for either Arizona, Philadelphia, or Minnesota in the wild-card round of the playoffs. Aaron Rodgers didn’t play well enough early in the year to merit MVP talk, but his numbers are bananas: He’s thrown for 4,199 passing yards with 29 touchdowns and only seven interceptions.

3. The Bengals were never about style points. Their only blowout win came against the Bears despite a lot of the league’s worst teams on the schedule. It says a lot about how far this team has come that people will complain about Sunday’s 17-10 win over the Chiefs that clinched the AFC North.

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The victory had a lot of hallmarks of the Bengals season. The secondary was stifling, Cedric Benson rushed for 133 yards, and Carson Palmer pulled off an incredible drive when the team needed it most. The Bengals believe they can win close games in the fourth quarter, and they usually do. We’ll see if that’s enough for a playoff win.

4. Dallas’ victory over Washington on Sunday night means that next week’s game against the Eagles is for the NFC East title. Yet it doesn’t mean much. The likelihood for a Cowboys-Eagles matchup in the wild-card round is large, no matter who wins the East.

Woodley saves the day
The Steelers still need a lot of help to make the playoffs. With an effort befitting a champion, they are not going out easy. Lamarr Woodley was the reason Pittsburgh survived Baltimore 23-20 on Sunday. The outside linebacker forced a Joe Flacco interception in the first quarter when he hit Flacco’s arm as the ball was thrown.

With the Ravens in field-goal range in the fourth quarter, Woodley put in a series for the ages. He stuffed Ray Rice for a two-yard gain on second down, sacked Flacco on third down, and then forced a fumble on a sack on fourth down. Game over.

Could these coaches get off hot seat?
1. At 5-7, Gary Kubiak was facing career mortality. After three straight wins, including Sunday’s 27-20 triumph in Miami, we suspect he is safe. The Texans have built their franchise up the right way with homegrown players. They lost a number of close games to quality teams this year, but Texans owner Bob McNair doesn’t want to start over from scratch. Houston remains alive for a playoff berth, but needs help and a victory over the Patriots next week. New England could possibly rest Tom Brady in that game.

The Texans have lost countless “Biggest games in franchise history” this year, but finally won one. Congrats.

2. Break up the Browns! Eric Mangini’s squad has won three straight games — including beating the Raiders 23-9 Sunday — to improve to 4-11. Unfortunately for him, and fortunately for Browns fans, it’s hard to imagine Mike Holmgren keeping a coach that isn’t a West Coast offense disciple.

3. The Panthers may have saved John Fox’s job with their effort over the last three weeks. Carolina played New England tough on the road, then handled Minnesota and the Giants easily. The Panthers are 7-8 after a 0-3 start. This season didn’t go as hoped, but Fox gets his team to play consistently. Now they just need a quarterback, and they don’t seem to think it’s Matt Moore.

4. Head coach Raheem Morris has undeniably improved Tampa’s defense since he took over as coordinator. The Bucs have back-to-back road wins after their stunning 20-17 victory over New Orleans to improve to 3-12. We suspect that won’t be enough to save Morris’ job if the Bucs could land a big name like Bill Cowher.

Don’t panic
1. The sky will be falling over Bourbon Street this week, but New Orleans’ loss to Tampa ultimately isn’t that meaningful. The Saints will be a lot healthier for the playoffs and remain very likely to get the top seed in the NFC.

We would be very careful of ascribing too much meaning to losses by the Saints that put their record at 13-2. The results will be disappointing in the short term, but this was never an unbeatable squad. They escaped many close games against poor opponents all year. They just need to refocus, get healthy, and work on improving the protection for Drew Brees. Two home wins in the NFC will be challenging, but that would have been the case whether the Saints were 15-0 or 13-2.

2. The Ravens missed a chance to go to the playoffs Sunday in Pittsburgh. Penalties overturned two Ravens touchdowns and an interception of Ben Roethlisberger late in the game. The team had eleven penalties in all, and Derrick Mason dropped a wide open touchdown in the third quarter.

Despite all that, the Ravens still control their playoff fate. Win in Oakland next week and the they are in.

Stick a fork in 'em
1. Chad Henne had a strong year overall, but showed a troubling tendency towards streakiness. When things turned bad, they tended to get worse for a while. Miami fought back valiantly after falling down 27-0, but their secondary and running game made too many mistakes.

2. The NFL is a passing league, and the Jaguars never had a playoff caliber secondary or passing attack. The team’s 35-7 loss in New England showed the flaws that have been apparent all year. They don’t have depth at receiver or cornerback. You can’t pin this loss on David Garrard, but he’s had a lot of key interceptions over the last two weeks where balls have sailed on him.

3. The Giants have gone from Super Bowl champs to deposed top seed in the NFC to out of the playoffs. And it’s all because of the defense.

Even Peyton can't overcome dumb decision
The moment was jarring, even if it was expected. Leading 15-10 in the third quarter against the Jets, the Colts chose to lose. They took out Peyton Manning.

Curtis Painter came in, the Jets defense took over, and Indy lost to the Jets 29-15.

The Colts decided that all the champagne the 1972 Dolphins had popped over the years was worthless. They said they didn’t care about going undefeated and proved it.

Colts general manager Bill Polian warned us this would happen all season. Still scarred from an experience when he lost a key player during a meaningless game as GM of the Bills, Polian had his organizational philosophy for a while and isn’t going to change it for history.

Philosophies are great, but the Colts are dealing with human beings, not theory. The Colts players, including Peyton Manning, were clearly disappointed to give up. The fans at Lucas Oil Stadium were robbed out of a memorable experience. Even coach Jim Caldwell might have not agreed with the decision, although we’ll never know who made the final call.

Manning hasn’t missed a start in his NFL career. Couldn’t the Colts trust him for 20 more minutes?

We get it: Winning a Super Bowl title is all that matters. This Colts team has demonstrated again and again they are tough enough to do so. They have overcome fourth-quarter deficits all year and their defense has overcome a scheme change to become better than any Tony Dungy-led Colts squad.

It just makes no sense that the Colts have to overcome their own management too.

NFL game stories Quick look at Week 3 games JETS 31, DOLPHINS 23: Edwards returns to makes key TD catch  |    Highlights COWBOYS 27, TEXANS 13: Dallas avoids rare 0-3 start  |    Romo excited FALCONS 27, SAINTS 24, OT: Champs miss short FG in OT  |    Saints explain loss TITANS 29, GIANTS 10: Johnson scores 2 TDs  |    Coughlin takes blame EAGLES 28, JAGUARS 3: Vick makes Reid's decision look great  |    QB thrilled COLTS 27, BRONCOS 13: Manning throws 3 TD passes VIKINGS 24, LIONS 10: Peterson's career-long 80-yard TD keys win PATRIOTS 38, BILLS 30: 14th straight win in series for New England SEAHAWKS 27, CHARGERS 20: Washington has two kickoff returns for TDs CHIEFS 31, 49ERS 10: K.C. 3-0 for first time since '03  |    Chiefs confident STEELERS 38, BUCCANEERS 13: Batch shines in first start in 3 years RAMS 30, REDSKINS 16: Only second win in last 29 games for St. Louis RAVENS 24, BROWNS 17: Flacco fires 3 TD passes BENGALS 20, PANTHERS 7: Clausen struggles in first NFL start CARDINALS 24, RAIDERS 23: Janikowski misses 32-yard FG on final play